A catalogue of Western manuscripts at the Bodleian Libraries and selected Oxford colleges

MS. Bodl. 208

Summary Catalogue no.: 2033

Contents

(fols. 1r-156v)
Peter Comestor, Historia scolastica
Rubric: Hystoria scolastica de Veteri & Nouo Testamento
Incipit: Imperatorie maiestatis est
Explicit: scilicet in chathacumbis
Final rubric: Liber historiarum magistri Petri Commestori

With marginal notes.

Language(s): Latin

On fols. ii-vi, 157 are theological notes written with a metal stylus, and partly illegible.

Language(s): Latin

Physical Description

Secundo Folio: pro quantitate luminis
Form: codex
Support: parchment
Extent: pastedown + v + 156 + iii + pastedown
Dimensions (leaf): 335 × 240 mm.
Foliation:

Front endleaves: non-medieval pencil Roman numerals ii-vi in top RH corner.

Main text: seventeenth-century ink Arabic numerals 1-156 in top RH corner.

Back endleaves: non-medieval pencil Arabic numeral 157-159 in top RH corner.

Collation

Medieval pastedown, 4 bifolia bound as a quire of 8 where leaves 4, 5, and 8 are stubs, 18, 26, 38, 410, 5-6 8, 710, 8-188, 1912 [11 is a stub], 1 bifolium with wide stub pasted over pastedown, pastedown.

Quires 3-7 and 11 numbered with Roman numerals III-VII and XI in ink.

All in black ink, in bottom RH corner, first words of next quire (unless otherwise stated), appear the end of quires 3, 7-13, 15-16, 18. Also at the beginning of quires 4-6 and 12 in bottom LH corner, beginning of quire 6 has the last word of the previous quire.

Layout

2 columns of c. 50 lines, ink- and plummet-ruled. Pricking in inner margin. Ruled space: 230 × 135 mm. Line height: 5mm.

Hand(s)

Fols. 1r-146v written in a protogothic hand

Fols. 147r-156v written in a hand with more Gothic features

Decoration

??? in red and blue, 2-20 lines high. 5 on each side of the folio on average.

Binding

s. xv

340 × 235 × 60 mm.

Endleaves: At the front, a fragment pastedown in situ, possibly at one time wrapped around the following endleaves, but now a little distorted; followed by 8 non-fragment leaves bound as a quire, where leaves 4, 5, and 8 are stubs, with some text in ?plummet. At the back, the final leaf of the last quire is blank; followed by a non-fragment bifolium with a wide stub, and a non-fragment pastedown in situ, these have plummet some plummet and ink text and pen trials.

Sewing: Sewn at five sewing stations (measured in mm): 55, 110, 160, 215, 265 from the top of the spine.

Boards: Wooden boards around 7mm thick, including cover. The sewing supports enter the boards from the outside. Boards have some bevelling and do not project beyond the bookblock.

Endbands: Braided light brown leather endbands.

Cover: Whittawed leather cover. Turn ins mostly pared at either board, with tongued mitres in the visible corners.

Fastenings and furniture: Two pairs of holes, and damage to cover at foredge of upper board, with corresponding pairs of three nails and verdigris at foredge of lower board are the remains of two clasps.

Chaining: Chain-staple holes from Bodleian (top RH corner of upper board) and St George's Chapel, Windsor (bottom centre of upper board).

History

Origin: s.xiiiex ; English

Provenance and Acquisition

Witham, charterhouse (?): '"Witham" (s. xv), written small near the top of fol. ii recto. Whether it indicates that the MS comes from W. Charterhouse is doubtful.' (MLGB)

Windsor, collegiate chapel: 'Liber Collegij de Wyndesore', 16th cent.

Presented by the dean and canons of Windsor in 1612.

MS. Bodl. 208 - front pastedown

Contents

Language(s): Latin

Historia Scholastica Peter Comestor

Reject leaf. Text begins in the same place as fol. 147r in main manuscript, with 'imperatorum et incommoda' and ends with 'Et considerans ubi esset uenit'

Physical Description

Form: codex
Support: parchment
Dimensions (leaf): 330 × 230 mm.

Layout

Two columns of 49 lines. Written space: 230 × 135 mm. Line height: 5mm.

Hand(s)

Same as fols. 1r-146v of main manuscript.

Decoration

One red initial 4 lines high, with green pen-flourishes.

Additions: Contents for main manuscript added in an Anglicana hand Text from Jerome's commentary on Matthew in a hand roughly contemporary to that of the contents, on the stuck down side of the pastedown.

History

Origin: s.xiii ; English

Additional Information

Last Substantive Revision

2020-04-21: Description revised to incorporate all information in SC.